yara

yara, a series of nine steel feathers by internationally acclaimed Waanyi artist Judy Watson, was conceived as a group of sentinels to watch over and protect the Flinders University campus at Bedford Park. Honouring the Kaurna Ancestor Spirit Tjilbruke—represented by the glossy ibis—the work pays tribute to the Kaurna people, Traditional Owners of the land on which the University stands.

The feather-like forms are positioned across the plaza and connected by poetic lines gifted by Kaurna Elder, Dr. Uncle Lewis Yarlupurka O’Brien. These texts speak of the stars, the river in the Milky Way (Wardlipari), and the deep connection between sky, land, and water:

Reaching skyward, the plume-like forms evoke the meeting of earth and sky expressed in the text. The feathers also acknowledge the legacy of the University’s namesake Matthew Flinders, as seen in the maps of the South Australian coastline charted by the navigator and applied in the treatment of the work. These maps, made aboard The Investigator (1801-1803), are overlaid with Kaurna words as a gesture to the layering of history and cultural memory at this site.

Viewed as quills, the feathers are also symbols of scholarship and knowledge—reflecting Flinders University's commitment to teaching, learning and research.  yara, the title of the work, refers to Kaurna ideas of reciprocity and ‘two way’ learning that takes place in a shared space.